


until you catch fire

by stophit



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, Injury, M/M, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-30
Updated: 2020-07-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:49:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25616899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stophit/pseuds/stophit
Summary: The first rule of performing is that something will always go wrong.
Relationships: Boo Seungkwan/Chwe Hansol | Vernon
Comments: 3
Kudos: 130





	until you catch fire

**Author's Note:**

> (I wrote this before the announcement and now I feel like an ass)

The first rule of performing is that something will always go wrong. Equipment will break, costumes will tear, and—should they be unlucky—someone will get injured.

Hansol tells himself this because if it’s inevitable, he can prepare for it. He can prepare to see his members backstage surrounded by medical staff checking their blood pressure and giving them oxygen, because that’s normal. Sprains, medical tape, cuts and scrapes—they’re all part of the experience, and rarely do any of them leave with lasting injuries, or so he hopes.

Somehow, encore stages become the greatest worry. With the amount of times they’ve gone across the world, it’s always the encores where things get hazy; it’s the end of a strenuous concert, and while SEVENTEEN never gets _complacent_ , they start overdoing it. Confetti on the stage makes things slippery when their constant water slinging doesn’t, and with their nonstop jumping, it’s a miracle nothing worse than slipping and landing on their asses has happened yet.

Their members getting hurt during performances shouldn’t be anything new. Hell, even Hansol _himself_ got an injury on stage once, one that left him sitting for the entire rest of the tour. He should be used to the possibility of injury, because it’s not just a possibility. It’s an inevitability. As a group—of musicians, of friends—they push themselves too hard, work too hard.

All the reminders, the rational inevitabilities—all that goes out the window when Seungkwan jumps during their encore and slips.

Hansol knows a bad fall when he sees one.

He’s the first one to scream Seungkwan’s name, mic dangling uselessly from his hand as he starts rushing over. Seungkwan’s name ripples outward from his mouth to the other members tittering in his monitor to the rest of the crowd’s swell of noise. In that instant, he forgets where he is, not bothering with checking where the cameras are or where they’re pointing.

It’s stupid, and it’s careless, and he’s knocked out of the stupor not even a second later when he sees Soonyoung crouching beside Seungkwan with a smile on his face. Here on the catwalks, there’s no angle where one person could block the entire crowd from seeing Seungkwan, so he leads by example.

Hansol slows down to a light jog, because as bad as one fall was, a second one because he’s rushing would just be worse. The others start joking around, because their mics are still hot and it’s a show until the bitter end.

“Kwannie,” Soonyoung says. His lips brush over his mic, always uncomfortably close. “You all right?”

Nothing worries Hansol more than watching Seungkwan lift his mic to his lips so he can say, “It’s gonna take more than a little fall to keep me down!”

Just a little fall, his _ass_ _._

As the crowd cheers, cooing with mingled chants of _Take care, Seungkwan!_ like a congregation’s prayer, Soonyoung helps Seungkwan up and Hansol sees that split second of pain. He’s already converting that pain by screaming lyrics into his microphone, but he can see a tremor in his hands.

The others continue on. They sing again. The camera ends up elsewhere, and Hansol, after what feels like an eternity, finally reaches Seungkwan and Soonyoung. “I’m fine,” Seungkwan grits out in a way that is decidedly _not_ fine.

The others must be able to tell that Seungkwan’s injury is more than just the usual slip and fall onto their asses on rainy stages, on water-covered walkways or on strips of confetti in the wrong place. They pick up the pace, telling the crowd to jump, jump, _jump_ as time slows around the three of them.

For people like them in this situation, there is no _slowing_. If time slows, then they only move faster. Soonyoung turns the mic on his earpiece away from his mouth and starts hobbling with Seungkwan. “Hey—Noni?” And even though a perpetual smile is plastered on his face, Hansol’s not blind. He watches everyone closer than they might give him credit for.

It’s hard to be in good shape near the end of a tour, even when they want nothing more than to end with high spirits.

“Yeah,” he says, not even sure if he’s got the right idea. As he walks backward, waving his hands pretending to be an air traffic controller, he gives Seungkwan his mic. Seungkwan doesn’t question the action, taking it with a raised eyebrow and nothing else.

When he turns around and leans over as an offer for a piggyback ride, he can still see Seungkwan’s reaction—the main screen’s camera is back on the three of them.

He knows that there’s always at least one camera on him. Even now, there must be dozens, if not _hundreds_ of Carats pointing their phones at them or at the screen, but he can’t find it in himself to look anything but concerned to the point of anger when Seungkwan tries to play it off with a pout where everyone can see.

“I’m not taking no for an answer,” Hansol screams over the noise. It sounds like a whisper—not from the crowd’s chaos, but from Seungkwan’s silent complaint written in his upturned nose and his pout.

Despite being professionals about dating while in the public eye, despite all of the training he’s had for expressions and public appearance and his image, little bubbles of anger start rising from within him. This isn’t the time for Seungkwan’s stubbornness, nor is it the time for Hansol’s dedication to telling him that he’s worth the world and the stars and everything beyond, and it’s that which he resents more than anything. He _refuses_ to let Seungkwan suffer and put on a smile.

“Seungkwan-ah, c’mon,” he insists, irritation leaking between his teeth as he tries to smile. He’s not good at faking smiles. Everyone knows that, from Seungkwan to the Carats around them to Soonyoung—who can sense the tension and, with his free hand, smacks Hansol on the ass. It’s distracting enough that Seungkwan laughs before making a show of giving up.

It’s lucky they’ve been together for so long that this back and forth, this flash of anger, this concern passes in a mere few seconds. It feels like an eternity every time they fight, but they know how to tide each other over or give each other strength.

Seungkwan’s weight is familiar in any form, always a comfort in its smaller perseverance. Soonyoung guides him onto Hansol’s back; Seungkwan is like a furnace, sweltering from exertion and sweating through his shirt, but there’s no amount of discomfort Hansol won’t endure for him.

Seungkwan puts his head on Hansol’s shoulder as they adjust to the new arrangement, but they both know it for what it is—not a momentary change in position, but a silent kiss without lips. He smiles out of relief when Seungkwan wraps his arms around his neck with a huff of breath. “Hansol,” he says into his ear, slightly labored.

“You’re a mess,” Hansol says with as much fondness as he can muster, and he bounces up and down to the beat of _Holiday_. Seungkwan pinches his cheek.

“But you love me.”

The main camera has moved elsewhere by the time he can lift his head to look at something that _isn’t_ Seungkwan. Soonyoung salutes at them and runs back to Seokmin and Minghao, but the fans and behind-the-scenes cameras never stop watching. They’re getting into dangerous territory with this—but they have been for years and years, anyway. “Obviously.”

It’s at that moment that the main camera switches back to the two of them as they start to regroup with the other members on their largest stage, just in time to catch Seungkwan’s shock. It doesn’t take him long to recover, always faster than Hansol; he holds Hansol’s mint-coloured microphone up to his lips and says, for everyone to hear, “Vernonnie, how heavy am I? Are you sure you can handle this?”

What else has Hansol been doing if not getting stronger for everyone’s sake? There’s no shortage of members in SEVENTEEN that can carry each other without breaking a sweat, but at the same time, there’s never enough. Things going wrong might be inevitable, but how he responds is always evolving.

Seungkwan shoves the mic against Hansol’s lips with so much vigour it would chip his teeth if his lips weren’t in the way, but he doesn’t dare remove either hand from around Seungkwan’s legs to give him even a playful nudge or move it farther away. “It’s hard having the weight of the world on my shoulders, but I’ll manage.”

For all the cameras pointed at them, he hopes they capture his wide, honest grin when Seungkwan smacks him out of embarrassment.


End file.
